An autumn dish from Vienna: pumpkin and garlic are cooked until soft in verjus and blended into a velvety soup. Each plate gets sautéed pumpkin cubes, a wedge of vineyard peach and Viennese snails, and the soup is poured at the table. The recipe comes from Dominik Hayduck for Gugumuck, the Viennese snail farm.

Pumpkin verjus soup with Viennese snails

Dominik Hayduck for Gugumuck

Velvety pumpkin soup made with verjus, served with Viennese snails and vineyard peach.

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Prep Time 20

Cook Time 40

Total Time 1

Course Soup, Starter

Cuisine Austrian

Servings 4 people

Ingredients

1 medium pumpkin e.g. Long of Naples
5 garlic cloves
500 ml Vinberg Verjus sour 400 ml for the soup, the rest for the snails
2 tbsp water
24 Viennese snails in stock
1 vineyard peach
butter
salt, pepper and nutmeg

Instructions

Peel and deseed the pumpkin. Cut part of it into small cubes, which will go into the soup later. Cut the rest into pieces of about 5 × 5 cm.
Cook the large pumpkin pieces with the garlic, 400 ml verjus and the water until the pumpkin is completely soft. Blend until smooth and season with salt and nutmeg.
Sauté the small pumpkin cubes in a little butter until translucent and season with salt and freshly ground pepper. Cut the peach into wedges.
Drain the snails and warm them gently in the remaining verjus.
To serve, place the pumpkin cubes in the centre of each plate, top with a peach wedge and add 3–4 snails. Pour the soup from a small jug at the table.